Clive Owen

After a decade of steady work on British television, actor Clive Owen broke out internationally with American art house success of the taut crime-thriller "Croupier" (2000). With his rugged good looks...
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Clive Owen's new movie Children of Men has joined the Oscars race after leading the pack at the influential Austin Film Critics Association Awards.
The movie missed out on the Best Film prize, which went to 9/11 dramatization United 93, but it was named among the 10 best films of 2006, and claimed three major honors.
Alfonso Cuaron was named Best Director and the Mexican filmmaker and his four co-screenwriters also grabbed the award for Best Adapted Screenplay. Emmanuel Lubezki won Best Cinematography for his innovative camera work in the film.
Meanwhile, The Departed swept both the lead and supporting male acting categories--Oscars favorite Leonardo DiCaprio was named Best Actor while Jack Nicholson took home the Best Supporting Actor prize for his acclaimed role as a seedy gang boss.
Mexican moviemaker Guillermo Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth was also a double winner--for Best Foreign Film and Best Original Screenplay.
Teenager Ellen Page was the surprise winner of the Austin critics' Best Actress honor for her role as a precocious girl who traps an Internet child predator in Hard Candy.
Babel star Rinko Kikuchi was named Best Supporting Actress for her role as a Japanese mute in the acclaimed Brad Pitt drama.
Dreamgirls star Jennifer Hudson, a red-hot Oscars favorite, was named Breakthrough Artist, while Brick writer/director Rian Johnson won the prize for Best First Film.
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Based on British mystery writer P.D. James’ rather downbeat novel Men takes place in the not-too-distant future where the world is definitely not right. In fact society is facing extinction since the human race has lost the ability to reproduce; there hasn’t been a new child born in 18 years. But as the tagline reads “…all that can change in a heartbeat.” While the rest of England is unraveling as civil unrest runs rampant a young woman named Kee (Clare-Hope Ashitey) is found miraculously pregnant and Theo (Clive Owen) a disillusioned government agent agrees to help secretly transport her to a sanctuary at sea where her child's birth may help scientists save the future of mankind. So sets in motion a race against time fraught with many horrific obstacles. Children of Men collects a first-rate cast. Leading the pack is Owen as yet another reluctant antihero. It’s a good part for the somewhat depressive actor who seems at ease when everything is going to hell around him (see Inside Man Closer etc.). Theo is initially drawn into the Kee conflict because his ex-wife a terrorist/activist--played with brief but quiet determination by Julianne Moore—asks him to. See they share their own personal tragedy so saving Kee and the baby becomes even more important to them. Newcomer Ashitey shines as Kee who really doesn’t understand at all what is happening to her but has a fair amount of spunk anyway. Other standouts include Chiwetel Ejiofor (Kinky Boots) as one of Moore’s compadres with his own nefarious agenda and Michael Caine as an old friend of Theo--a throwback to a more peaceful time. Representing both old and new school Ejiofor and Caine are actors you can simply put in any film and somehow they will make them that much better. But Children of Men’s true brilliance comes from its creator. Co-writer/director Alfonso Cuaron is simply one of the most exciting cinematic storytellers working today. No genre is out of his reach. He has done kiddie flicks (A Little Princess) sexy coming-of-age dramas (Y Tu Mama Tambien)—and even a splashy Harry Potter installment (Prisoner of Azkaban probably the best one so far). And now Men a futuristic thriller that he crafts with absolute bone-chilling effect. Cuaron’s world is not a very happy place with the skies consistently gray with pollution and violence injustice and human cruelty around every corner. When Theo and Kee are on the run you’re expecting the worst at any moment but that’s not really where Cuaron’s head is at. He wants us to have hope. As the director puts it in the film’s production notes “Humanity has an amazing talent for destruction. But also we can show solidarity and an ability to come through problems together. In the end Children of Men isn’t so much about humanity being destructive—its more about ideologies coming between people’s judgment and their actions that is at work in this story.” I couldn’t have said it any better.

Clive Owen is the latest star to defend the casting of Daniel Craig as James Bond, even though he originally hoped to land the role.
The Sin City actor was tipped for the coveted part of the suave superspy before Craig was announced as Pierce Brosnan's successor last year.
But Owen is thrilled that a "proper actor" has finally been cast as 007, and insists new movie Casino Royale will silence Craig's critics.
He says, "I think when Craig first took the part he got a pretty rough ride, which to a certain extent is inevitable because there are so many different people who have so many different ideas about something like that. You are never going to please everybody.
"The thing that is really exciting is that he is a proper actor. He is not shallow or posing. They have cast a really serious actor and I think that when the film comes out everyone will see what a great choice he was."
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If you thought a San Francisco police detective (Michael Douglas) was hard to break imagine how tough it is to sway a London shrink (David Morrissey). Leave it to Catherine Tramell (Sharon Stone) to try. The sinful author has resurfaced and--in the nearly decade and a half since the first Basic Instinct--moved to London. Old habits die hard however and she’s again being investigated for a sex-gone-awry homicide. This time it’s renowned shrink Michael Glass who’s charged with keeping a watchful eye on the elusive seductress--and does he ever! He tries to maintain his professional ethos but what’s a platonic doctor-patient non-relationship to him is the ultimate aphrodisiac to Tramell whom Dr. Glass diagnoses with “risk addiction” and delusions of omnipotence. And so begins the Freudian chess match: How long can he resist the femme fatale and how long can she resist him resisting her? In Basic Instinct 2 Stone makes us feel naughty--and not a “good” naughty. She looks great and there aren't any uh extra close-ups but subtly put almost 15 years have past since the first installment and Stone is no spring chick--er rabbit as it were. For her to still be oozing sex as if it’s only been a sequel-standard couple of years is creepy even though she looks nowhere near her age. The accompanying smolder and breathy voice make it hard not to laugh; she’s actually too regal an actress for this stuff. Morrissey--who strangely resembles the Smiths singer of the same name--does fine work with an unenviable role of a steely bloke intrigued by the seedy London underworld his patient enjoys. But it’ll take repeated broodings for him to be the next Clive Owen. The biggest waste of talent comes from Charlotte Rampling (Swimming Pool) as Glass’s mentor. She has no place here and that’s meant solely as a compliment. In some ways Basic Instinct 2 is such a shame: When the film operates purely as a murder mystery--at least for its first half--it’s somewhat engaging. Sadly the only reason there’s any interest in this long-delayed sequel at all is the prospects of sex to outlast its original. Thus it is clear to see how cantankerous a film this must’ve been for director Michael Caton-Jones but he does the best he can with all the sexual innuendo that leads up to all the sexual (anti-)climaxes. The completely absurd opening sequence gives it all up without even playing hard to get. It immediately feels like a traditionally slick dull and revelatory film whereas the first one offered us foreplay first before moving on to no-holds-barred sex; there’s neither that brand of foreplay nor sex here. More ridiculous still is the second half as the film eventually feebly attempts to hide improbable twists behind the sordid mind of a writer.

Dalton Russell (Clive Owen) tells us from the beginning to listen carefully cause he’s only going to tell this story once. And he isn’t kidding. You have to pay attention to Inside Man--blink and you might miss an important clue. Russell has concocted what he thinks is the perfect heist. It starts off with he and four others holding up a bank and taking everyone inside as hostages. NYPD hostage negotiators Detectives Keith Frazier (Denzel Washington) and Bill Mitchell (Chiwetel Ejiofor) are dispatched to the scene with orders to establish contact. But as things drag on and the robbers appear to consistently be one step ahead of the police Frazier's suspicions grow when Madeline White (Jodie Foster) a power player with shadowy objectives comes in to offer “assistance” in the matter. Seems her client the chairman of the bank Arthur Case (Christopher Plummer) is also personally interested in the moment-to-moment happenings inside the branch. Frazier is pretty convinced there’s more to this than just a bank job gone awry. But how to make the puzzle pieces fit…? Hardly anyone in Inside Man has to stretch much--and that’s just fine. No one really has to since the parts are tailor made for them. Washington a long-time Spike Lee favorite fits right in as the streetwise cop who doesn’t necessarily play by the rules but gets the job done. He and Ejiofor (Four Brothers) have a nice easy-going rapport as partners who’ve been together awhile. Owen plays another calm collected no-nonsense guy you empathize with who can look straight into the camera and tells it as it is. You definitely want him to get away with it. Only Foster gets to veer a little from her usual intelligent heroines to play someone who is still smart but also very cunning--and a little mean-spirited. It looks like she had a lot of fun doing it too in her smart three-piece suit and nasty pumps. In supporting roles Willem Dafoe does a nice turn as the befuddled S.W.A.T. leader while Plummer as a banker with a shady past sort of plays the antithesis to his goody too-shoes Captain Von Trapp in Sound of Music. He probably felt it was time. Having taken a break since 2004’s heavy-handed 25th Hour it’s clear Spike Lee wanted to have fun making Inside Man. In fact I bet he watched Dog Day Afternoon Marathon Man and a Ocean's Eleven in one evening and said “Hey I could make my own bank robbery-diamond/Nazi-heist movie.” And so he did--with his signature stamp all over it. Crafting his film first-timer writer Russell Gewitz’s script Lee draws you right in with the seemingly confessional opener by our bank robber and then never lets go. Actually he doesn't want it to end but that's a minor blip. As Inside Man jumps around in time you are definitely interested in trying to figure out the puzzle yourself even if there are too many pieces. And of course Lee has once again captured that New York state of mind. This is Spike’s city--tough racial and in your face. There are some hilarious scenes between the cops trying to work this thing out as well as between Frazier Mitchell and the hostages afterwards as they are being interrogated. Listen these New Yorkers aren’t about to take crap from a bunch of would-be bank robbers--or from the police.

Jennifer Aniston has launched a veiled attack on former husband Brad Pitt, insinuating his relationship with Angelina Jolie is a "mistake".
The actress, who split from Troy star Pitt in January and divorced him nine months later, is notoriously reluctant to discuss the break-up--which Pitt is rumored to have initiated after falling for co-star Jolie on the set of Mr. and Mrs. Smith.
But speaking about new movie Derailed, in which she has an extra-marital affair with Clive Owen, she vigorously condemns cheating spouses.
The 36-year-old says, "You can have everything wonderful in the world, and you can just make stupid choices because you're bored for a moment or you're not fulfilled for a moment, and you take that time and it affects everything.
"And I think we've all seen someone make a mistake and then try to get out of it instead of nipping it in the bud right off the bat, so that it spirals and spirals down."
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Derailed doesn't waste any time. After a scene of spousal bickering between Deanna and Charles Schine (Melissa George and Clive Owen) Charles is on the commuter train flirting with stunning--and also married--business exec Lucinda (Jennifer Aniston). It would make sense the two best-looking people on a crowded train would find one another. Before long they're in a cheap motel room trysting away. But they soon find themselves in much more trouble than they bargained for. A thug (Vincent Cassel) busts into the room to rob them and sums up what they are doing there pretty quickly. He does a few extra nasty things namely to Lucinda and then leaves. But that isn’t the last we hear of him. Soon Charles is being blackmailed by the guy who threatens to tattle--or worse--if he doesn't get what he wants thus planting the seeds that will bloom into cookie-cutter twists. It's been far too long since Owen smiled in one of his movies. He again broods his way through Derailed eschewing and suppressing any dramatic fireworks letting it all just simmer below the surface. I’m just saying maybe it’s time for a comedy. For Aniston she’s proven she can do dramatic with her stellar turn in the indie The Good Girl. But her foray into the dark world of adulterous affairs is at best iffy here. Her Friends perkiness still plagues her--and to top it off her screen time in Derailed is very limited. The lone bright spot is French actor Cassel best known for playing cat and mouse games with George Clooney in Ocean's Twelve. His varied performance greatly overshadows his A-list co-stars. Derailed is Swedish director Mikael Hafstrom first English-language film (his Evil was nominated for a Best Foreign Film Oscar in 2004) but chances are it won’t be his last. His careful slow-burn technique with Derailed should generate plenty of future offers especially since he understands how to sell a film which may or may not make him proud. It seems at times as though he wanted to go for a more urban-noir Euro-caper feel but was perhaps overruled by the Weinstein brothers (former heads of Miramax) who chose a more commercialized Derailed to launch their new production company. In any event despite a weak script full of gaping holes in logic the movie moves smoothly.

Jennifer Aniston found herself in the hot seat during a recent taping of CNN's Larry King Live when the veteran broadcaster relentlessly questioned her about her rumored romance with Vince Vaughn.
The former Friends star was on the show, which will air tonight, with British actor Clive Owen to promote their new movie Derailed when King turned up the heat.
But a squirming Aniston wasn't about to reveal anything. Giggling awkwardly when King started asking about the rumors, Aniston said, "God, I'm getting out of here."
And when the inquisitive host refused to let up with his line of questioning, the actress simply repeated the chat show king's words as he said, "Vince Vaughn, we love him," and "He's a national treasure."
But when King asked if the romance is serious, smiling Aniston just shook her head and said, "I'm not talking about it, I'm not talking about it... It sounds harsh to say 'it's none of your business' (but) you learn your lessons, that's all."
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Appeared as Sir Walter Raleigh opposite Cate Blanchett in the film "Elizabeth: The Golden Age"

Starred opposite Jennifer Aniston in the thriller "Derailed"

Became a member of the Young Vic, performing in several plays, such as "Romeo and Juliet"

Teamed with Naomi Watts and director Tom Tykwer for "The International"

Won praise for his performance as an incestuous brother in Steven Poliakoff's "Close My Eyes"

Played the title role in Antoine Fuqua's version of "King Arthur"

Starred in the horror thriller "Intruders"

Starred alongside Paul Giamatti in the film "Shoot 'Em Up"

Appeared on the BBC series "Second Sight" as Chief Inspector Ross Tanner (aired on PBS in the US)

First major Hollywood film, "The Rich Man's Wife"

Played a valet in Robert Altman's "Gosford Park"; second collaboration with Helen Mirren

Directed by Poliakoff in "Century"

Received international acclaim for his role in Mike Hodges' "Croupier"

Summary

After a decade of steady work on British television, actor Clive Owen broke out internationally with American art house success of the taut crime-thriller "Croupier" (2000). With his rugged good looks and low key charm, comparisons to the great Sean Connery seemed inevitable as he delivered a series of strong performances in such films as "Gosford Park" (2001) and "The Bourne Identity" (2002). Nearly unanimous praise was heaped on the actor for his wicked performance in Mike Nichols' brutal relationship drama, "Closer" (2005) - in a role he had originated on the stages of London - followed by a stylistic about-face as part of Robert Rodriguez's hyper-stylized neo-noir "Sin City" (2005), adapted from Frank Miller's graphic novel. His work in the intelligent, affecting and ultimately terrifying look into the near-future "Children of Men" (2006) secured Owen's status as one of Hollywood's top talents. He showed exceptional comic timing opposite Julia Roberts in the sexy satire "Duplicity" (2009) in addition to a willingness to tackle historical icons in acclaimed work like "Hemingway & Gellhorn" (HBO, 2012). While harkening back to the leading men of film's golden era, Owen also brought to the table an unmistakably 21st-Century artistic sensibility, making him both an actor's actor and bona fide movie star.

Met when they performed the leads in "Romeo and Juliet"; Married March 6, 1995

Jess Owen

Father

Divorced from Clive's mother c. 1968; son was a teen, they remain estranged

Pamela Owen

Mother

Divorced from Clive's father c. 1968; Remarried and raised son with new husband

Eve Owen

Daughter

Born in 1999; mother, Sarah-Jane Fenton

Hannah Owen

Daughter

Born in 1997; mother, Sarah-Jane Fenton

Education

Name

Royal Academy of Dramatic Art

Notes

"Parenthood and family come first for me. When I'm not working I'm cool with the 'Teletubbies.'" – Owen to Biography magazine, Summer 2004

"When I got into drama school," he says. "I really felt like someone plucked me out of the life I was in and put me on the path to somewhere else." – Owen to GQ magazine, March 2005

"It used to tickle me when I went to the premieres and American journalists in particular would say, 'That was so brave that you would do that role.' Somebody offered me a great f*cking part! What's brave about it?" – Owen to Playboy magazine, September 2007

Director Tom Tykwer calls Owen, "the thinking man's action hero. He is physically impressive, but he can still show that he's vulnerable." – from USA Today, Feb. 10, 2009

Mike Nichols, who directed Owen in "Closer" (2004): "Clive's the best example of the actor stripped of the cum-Strasberg, cum-Actors Studio torture of emotion. Here's a guy who comes to work, gets his coffee, knows his lines. Then someone will say 'Action,' he'll terrify everyone in the room, then we cut, and he picks up his coffee again. It's a job." – from Esquire magazine, March 2009